EDUCATION

RESEARCH 

Preliminary 

Observations on the 

Institute of Education 

Sciences' Research and 

Evaluation Efforts

Statement of George A. Scott, Director

Education, Workforce, and Income Security Issues

Testimony 

Before the Committee on 

Education and the Workforce, 

House of Representatives

For Release on Delivery 

Expected at 10 a.m. EDT

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

GAO-13-852T

United States Government Accountability Office
United States Government Accountability Office

Highlights of GAO-13-852T, a report to the 

Committee on Education and the Workforce, 

House of Representatives

September 10, 2013

EDUCATION RESEARCH

Preliminary Observations on the Institute of 

Education Sciences’ Research and Evaluation

Efforts

Why GAO Did This Study

The federal government has a 

longstanding role in conducting 

education research and collecting 

related data. The Education Sciences 

Reform Act of 2002 established IES as 

Education’s primary research and 

evaluation arm. With a budget of just 

under $600 million in fiscal year 2013, 

IES has a broad mission to provide its 

research, evaluations, and statistics to 

a wide variety of stakeholders, 

including researchers, parents, 

educators, and the general public.

This testimony reports on ongoing 

GAO work about IES. A full report will 

be issued later this year. Based on 

preliminary findings, this testimony will 

focus on: (1) the extent to which IES 

supports high-quality research and 

fulfills its mission, (2) the extent to 

which selected Education research and 

technical assistance groups 

disseminate relevant products to the 

education field, and (3) IES’s 

coordination within Education and with 

other federal agencies.

For this work, GAO reviewed agency 

documents and relevant federal 

legislation, interviewed agency officials 

and stakeholders, and analyzed 

information from selected research and 

technical assistance groups. GAO also 

compared IES’s practices to 

established guidelines for internal 

controls and effective program 

management and performance 

reporting. 

 

What GAO Found

The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) supports high-quality research, 

according to stakeholders, but lacks certain key procedures needed to 

fulfill other aspects of its mission. Since its inception, IES has

substantially improved the quality of education research. However, 

stakeholders expressed some concerns about IES’s ability to produce 

timely and relevant research that meets their various needs. For example,

IES’s efforts to respond quickly to its stakeholders are slowed, in part, 

because the time IES’s products have spent in peer review substantially 

increased this past year, and IES does not monitor some aspects of these 

timeframes. In addition, IES does not have a structured process for

incorporating stakeholder input into its research agenda, which previous 

GAO work has shown to be key to sound federal research programs. 

Lastly, IES’s performance measures do not fully reflect its current 

programs, which is not consistent with GAO’s leading practices for 

performance management. IES officials said, however, that they have 

begun to develop new performance measures for all of their programs.

Although the Department of Education’s (Education) research and 

technical assistance groups have taken steps to produce and disseminate 

relevant research to the field, IES does not always assess these efforts. 

Some stakeholders raised concerns about the relevance and 

dissemination of research and products from the Regional Educational

Laboratories (REL) and Research and Development Centers (R & D 

Center). For example, they told us that these groups do not always adapt

their products for use by both policymaker and practitioner audiences. 

Further, IES has not fully assessed REL and R & D Center relevance and 

dissemination efforts. As a result, IES does not know if these efforts are 

effective in meeting their mandated goal of providing usable research and 

information to policymakers and practitioners. GAO’s prior work on 

information dissemination suggests that further assessment could help to 

inform IES’s oversight of the RELs and R & D Centers to improve these 

groups’ dissemination to key audiences. 

IES works with federal education research agencies to increase the use 

of research evidence in federal decision-making, but according to 

officials, has limited ability to prioritize evaluations. IES and the National 

Science Foundation recently developed guidelines to help improve the 

quality of evidence resulting from federally-funded education research, 

which stakeholders said will benefit the education field. Within the 

department, IES plans evaluations of Education programs in concert with 

various other offices. However, Education officials said funding and 

program evaluation requirements prevent the agency from combining 

evaluation funds across programs, which limits their ability to conduct the 

evaluation projects they consider most important.

View GAO-13-852T. For more information, 

contact George A. Scott at (202) 512-7215 or 

scottg@gao.gov.
Page 1 GAO-13-852T

Chairman Kline, Ranking Member Miller, and Members of the Committee,

Thank you for inviting me here today to discuss the preliminary results of 

our ongoing work for this committee on the Department of Education’s 

(Education) Institute of Education Sciences (IES). For more than 100 

years, the federal government has invested in conducting education 

research and collecting education data. The Education Sciences Reform 

Act of 2002 (ESRA) outlines a broad mission for IES to expand 

fundamental knowledge and understanding of education and to provide 

this information to a wide variety of stakeholders, including parents, 

educators, researchers, policymakers, and the general public.1 As the 

primary research and evaluation arm of Education, IES is charged with 

providing information about educational policies, programs, and practices 

that improve academic achievement and access to educational 

opportunities for all students. In fiscal year 2013, IES had a budget of just 

under $600 million, which it used to support a range of research, data 

collection, and evaluation activities.2

Our analysis is based on a review of relevant federal laws and regulations 

as well as agency documents, including budget justifications, guidance 

and procedures, grantee and contractor performance work statements, 

and annual grantee and contractor performance reports. We also 

conducted interviews with officials from IES, other offices within 

Education, other federal agencies, and a range of stakeholder groups 

representing researchers, policymakers, and practitioners, as well as 

several members of IES’s advisory board—the National Board for 

Education Sciences (NBES). In addition, we interviewed the directors of 

the Regional Educational Laboratories (REL) and Comprehensive 

Technical Assistance Centers (Comprehensive Center), and administered 

a survey to the directors of the National Research & Development 

Centers (R & D Center). We selected these three research and technical 

In order to assist the Committee in 

the reauthorization of ESRA, my testimony will focus on (1) the extent to 

which IES supports high-quality research and fulfills its mission, (2) the 

extent to which selected Education research and technical assistance 

groups disseminate relevant products to the education field, and (3) IES’s 

coordination within Education and with other federal agencies.

 1 Pub. L. No. 107-279, Title I, Part A, § 111, 116 Stat. 1940, 1944.

2 According to IES, this figure does not include funds that support certain program 

evaluations conducted by IES, for example those required and funded by other statutes.
Page 2 GAO-13-852T

assistance groups because they are all authorized under the public law 

that included ESRA. Moreover, there is a statutory requirement for the 

Comprehensive Centers to coordinate their activities and to collaborate 

with the RELs, among others. We compared agency documents and 

procedures to GAO’s standards for internal control and criteria on 

performance management and reporting, as well as a framework GAO 

developed to identify key elements of sound federal research and 

evaluation programs.3

We are conducting our ongoing work in accordance with generally 

accepted government auditing standards. Those standards require that 

we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to 

provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our 

audit objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a 

reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions.

We intend to produce a report later this year that 

will provide our final results. We discussed our preliminary results with 

IES, and incorporated their comments as appropriate.

ESRA authorizes IES to conduct and support many different types of 

research and evaluations. Specifically, ESRA contains several key 

provisions related to the management, core functions, and processes of

IES: 

• all research conducted by IES is to use scientifically based research 

standards that include, where appropriate, making claims of causal 

relationships only in random assignment experiments;

• education evaluations conducted by IES are to employ experimental 

designs using random assignment, when feasible;

• all research, statistics, and evaluation reports conducted by or 

supported through IES must be subjected to rigorous peer review 

before being published or otherwise made available to the public; and

• the establishment of an advisory board—the NBES—whose duties 

include (1) advising and consulting with the Director of IES regarding 

 3 GAO, Managing for Results: Executive Branch Should More Fully Implement the GPRA 

Modernization Act to Address Pressing Government Challenges, GAO-13-518

(Washington, D.C.: June 26, 2013), Employment and Training Administration: More 

Actions Needed to Improve Transparency and Accountability of Its Research Program, 

GAO-11-285 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 15, 2011), Standards for Internal Control in the 

Federal Government, GAO/AIMD-00-21.3.1 (Washington, D.C.: November 1999) and 

Executive Guide: Effectively Implementing the Government Performance and Results Act,

GAO/GGD-96-118 (Washington, D.C.: June 1996).

Background
Page 3 GAO-13-852T

its policies and approving the Director’s overall research priorities, and 

(2) reviewing and approving procedures for peer review and reviewing 

the work of IES to ensure the consistency of scientifically valid 

research.

Education administers programs that support education research and 

technical assistance through grants and contracts involving several 

research groups—including the RELs and R & D Centers within IES and 

the Comprehensive Centers within the Office of Elementary and 

Secondary Education (see fig. 1).

Figure 1: Selected Education Research and Technical Assistance Groups
Page 4 GAO-13-852T

The National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance 

administers the REL program, a network of 10 regional entities that 

conduct applied research, develop and disseminate research and 

products, and conduct technical assistance and other activities to support 

the needs of state and local education agencies in their region. The 

Comprehensive Centers Program is a network of 22 technical assistance 

grantees that help to increase the capacity of state educational agencies 

(SEA) to assist districts and schools in meeting student achievement 

goals. Selected Comprehensive Centers focus on specific areas of 

expertise and produce research-based information and products for use 

by SEAs. Lastly, ESRA includes specific requirements for the 

administration of R & D Centers, which are designed to address areas of 

national need and each of which IES assigns at least one of the broad 

research topics outlined in the law. R & D Centers are also responsible 

for the production and dissemination of rigorous evidence and products 

that provide practical solutions to important education problems in the 

United States. The National Center for Education Research and the 

National Center for Special Education Research administer 17 R & D 

Centers in total.

In addition to IES, other entities conduct education-related research and 

evaluations, and ESRA includes general requirements for the Director of 

IES to coordinate its research and evaluation work with these entities, 

both within Education and across the rest of the federal government. 

Within Education, the Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy 

Development (OPEPD) conducts analyses and program evaluations on 

behalf of the department. Other federal agencies, such as the National 

Science Foundation and the National Institute for Child Health and 

Human Development—part of the National Institutes of Health—also 

support education-related research and the directors of these agencies 

serve as nonvoting ex officio members on the NBES.
Page 5 GAO-13-852T

In our ongoing work, we found that IES has substantially improved the 

education research field. In 2007, the Office of Management and Budget 

(OMB) assessed IES’s research and concluded that since its inception, 

IES had transformed the quality and rigor of research within Education 

and increased demand for scientifically based evidence of effectiveness 

in the education field as a whole.4 Likewise, many stakeholders we spoke 

with said IES’s research standards have improved the quality of 

Education’s research and had a positive influence on education research 

generally. More specifically, several stakeholders told us that IES 

products, such as its publications of education statistics reports, were 

useful for their work. While IES’s research grants and evaluations have 

resulted in many randomized controlled studies since the agency was 

established over 10 years ago, IES’s research standards also include 

guidelines for the implementation of other rigorous research 

methodologies, and it has recently funded studies using those 

methodologies, such as regression discontinuity or single-case designs.5

However, IES’s research is sometimes of limited usefulness to 

policymakers and practitioners. Some stakeholders told us that the 

research and evaluations supported by IES may not be completed soon 

enough to inform the decision making of policymakers and practitioners 

on important questions. For example, officials from one constituency 

based organization for policymakers said that IES’s evaluation of 

Education’s Race to the Top and School Improvement Grant Programs 

will not be released in time to give states the opportunity to implement 

lessons learned from these studies before these programs’ funding 

expires.

IES’s support of these multiple types of methodologies allows it to better 

meet its various stakeholders’ needs.

6

 4 Office of Management and Budget, ExpectMore.gov: Institute of Education Sciences 

Research, accessed August 1, 2013, http://georgewbushwhitehouse.archives.gov/omb/expectmore/summary/10009008.2007.html. 

5 Single-case designs are studies that involve repeated measurement of a single subject 

(e.g., a student or a classroom) and regression discontinuity designs compare outcomes 

for a treatment and control group that are formed based on the results of a preintervention 

measure. 

6 IES officials noted that, regardless of when funding for these specific programs ends, 

findings from these evaluations could help to inform education reform activities more 

broadly.

IES Has Supported 

High-Quality 

Research, but Lacks 

Key Processes 

and Performance 

Measures in 

Some Areas
Page 6 GAO-13-852T

The peer review process may exacerbate timeliness concerns. In order to 

ensure the high quality of IES’s work, ESRA requires IES-supported 

research reports to be peer reviewed before being published. In the past 

year, however, the time it takes to complete this review process has 

substantially increased, from an average of 117 days in fiscal year 2011 

to 175 days in fiscal year 2012. When asked for explanations for the 

increase in 2012, senior IES officials cited factors such as the complexity 

of the reports reviewed in that year and the time it took IES to work with 

its contractors on suitable responses to peer review comments. In 

accordance with GAO’s internal control standards, program managers 

should have access to and use operational data to determine whether 

they are meeting their agencies’ goals for effective and efficient use of 

resources.7

In addition, to address concerns about how relevant its research is to a 

range of stakeholders, IES is soliciting feedback and redesigning some 

existing programs. For example, IES recently convened a group of state 

and local education officials to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of 

the RELs and the What Works Clearinghouse, a website that IES uses to 

evaluate and disseminate education research evidence.

However, officials told us that while the peer review office 

within IES monitors the time taken for its review, IES does not monitor the 

time its Centers or contractors take to respond to peer review comments, 

which would allow it to take steps to mitigate delays, such as by holding 

contractors more accountable.

8

 7

IES also 

recently held a discussion with the NBES about how to make its research 

more relevant to policymakers and practitioners. Additionally, IES has 

reorganized several grant programs to focus on collaborations between 

researchers and state or local education agencies. In July 2013, six new 

grants were awarded for collaborative research projects, such as the 

design of a randomized postsecondary developmental education 

GAO/AIMD-00-21.3.1.

8 We previously reported on and made several recommendations related to the timeliness 

and dissemination activities of the What Works Clearinghouse. See GAO, Department of 

Education: Improved Dissemination and Timely Product Release Would Enhance the 

Usefulness of the What Works Clearinghouse, GAO-10-644. (Washington, D.C.: July 23, 

2010).
Page 7 GAO-13-852T

experiment in Texas and the development of a system to monitor 

students’ social and emotional learning in a school district in Nevada.9

Although IES has made recent efforts to increase the relevance of its 

research, IES does not have a structured process for incorporating 

feedback from policymakers and practitioners into its research agenda. 

Though there is no single way for government agencies to conduct 

research, in prior work we developed a framework to identify key 

elements that promote a sound federal research program using 

guidelines from several leading national research organizations. Within 

that framework, we found that agencies should establish a structured 

process for developing their research and evaluation priorities that 

considers key stakeholders’ input.10

Further, IES cannot demonstrate the impact of its efforts to improve the 

quality and relevance of its research in some areas because its 

performance measures have not been updated to reflect its current 

programs. Since 1993, all federal executive branch agencies have been 

required to set strategic goals, measure performance, and report on the 

degree to which goals were met in an effort to ensure government 

accountability and enhance public awareness about agencies’

As part of our ongoing work, we 

found individual IES Center Commissioners and the Director of IES have 

at times gathered input from groups of policymakers and practitioners, but 

that IES did not have an ongoing, structured process for collecting this 

input. Inconsistent outreach by IES may have contributed to gaps in its 

research. For example, stakeholders said that there is a shortage of 

research using varied methodologies that could allow for shorter 

turnaround times among IES-funded research projects.

 9 According to officials, 14 additional grants for supporting collaboration between 

researchers and policymakers and practitioners have been awarded since 2009 under the 

Evaluation of State and Local Education Programs and Policies grant program.

10 This framework includes five key elements: (1) agenda setting, (2) selecting research, 

(3) designing research, (4) conducting research, and (5) disseminating research results. 

See GAO-11-285. For more information on leading practices for research and evaluation 

planning, see also National Research Council, Rebuilding the Research Capacity at HUD

(Washington, D.C.: National Academies Press, 2008) and American Evaluation 

Association, An Evaluation Roadmap for a More Effective Government, (September 

2010), available at http://www.eval.org/d/do/107.
Page 8 GAO-13-852T

accomplishments.11 In addition, according to our internal control 

standards and leading practices on performance management, agencies 

should establish performance measures for their activities and continually 

compare actual performance data against these goals.12 To measure the 

effectiveness of its research grants, IES counts the number of IESsupported interventions that have been determined to be effective in 

improving student outcomes in particular areas. However, IES officials 

told us that its current performance measures, which were developed 

after the agency was established in 2002, no longer capture the scope of 

IES’s current research and priorities. Furthermore, in some cases, senior 

IES officials told us they are not relevant to managing the agency’s 

operations. For example, one measure relies on the results of a survey of 

potential users of the What Works Clearinghouse, but IES officials told us 

they will not conduct this survey because they do not believe it would 

yield enough useful information to be worth the investment. Moreover, a 

new performance measure was reported in Education’s fiscal year 2014 

budget request for IES that better reflects the results of its recent 

research. However this measure still does not include certain existing 

areas of IES research, such as research on the organization and 

management of schools and education systems. In addition, IES does not 

publicly report on the performance of the RELs, which constitute one of 

the agency’s largest investments. As we have reported, without 

performance measures, agencies may be at risk for failing to achieve 

their goals.13

IES officials told us they have begun work on revising their performance 

measures. Officials told us that they plan to include revised performance 

measures in Education’s fiscal year 2015 budget request for IES, and that 

it has begun discussions with OMB to establish these new measures. As 

of August 2013, IES officials told us they intend for the new performance 

 11 See, Government Performance and Results Act of 1993, Pub. L. No. 103-62, 107 Stat. 

285 (1993) and Government Modernization Act of 2010, Pub. L. No. 111-352, 124 Stat. 

3866 (2011). See also GAO-13-518.

12 See GAO/AIMD-00-21.3.1 and GAO, Internal Control Management and Evaluation 

Tool, GAO-01-1008G (Washington, D.C.: August 2001). For additional information about 

government performance management requirements and our related work, see our web 

page on leading practices for results-oriented management at 

www.gao.gov/key_issues/managing_for_results_in_government.

13 GAO-13-518.
Page 9 GAO-13-852T

measures they are developing to include all programs, including the RELs 

and its new grant programs for researcher-practitioner partnerships.

Research and technical assistance groups have taken various steps to 

provide relevant research to the education field. More specifically, to 

identify topics of relevance, RELs, R & D Centers, and Comprehensive 

Centers have engaged policymakers and practitioners in planning 

research and technical assistance activities. For example, beginning in 

2012, RELs were required to conduct their work through new or existing 

partnerships of practitioners, policymakers, and others—called research 

alliances—which would work together to use data and research to 

address specific concerns in education, such as improving low-performing 

schools or college readiness. All three groups use a range of methods to 

disseminate their research evidence and products, including publications, 

conferences, and in some cases, technical assistance resources 

specifically for teachers, such as professional development courses.

Despite these efforts, stakeholders—including practitioners and 

policymakers—have raised concerns about the relevance and 

dissemination of some of the research and products these groups have 

produced.14

 14 Comprehensive Centers conduct projects exclusively at the request of state clients and 

disseminate their work to these clients and to other Comprehensive Centers for their use. 

Therefore, we did not evaluate the relevance of the Comprehensive Centers’ products.

For example, a stakeholder group that represents local 

school districts, as well as two superintendents we spoke with, said they 

did not find REL research as relevant or as timely as other sources of 

research information. At the same time, several stakeholders said that the 

RELs’ new strategy of creating and working through research alliances 

could help increase the RELs’ focus on research questions of concern to 

the field. We also heard from stakeholders we spoke with that R & D 

Center research may have limited relevance to practitioners, because 

these centers consider the research community the primary audience for 

their products. As a result, they do not always adapt their research 

findings in a format that is readily understandable by practitioners, such 

as by producing non-technical reports and shorter research summaries. 

In addition to concerns about relevance, REL and R & D Center 

dissemination efforts are not always reaching policymakers and 

practitioners. Officials from some intermediaries—such as industry 

associations—we spoke with said their organizations disseminate 

Research and 

Technical Assistance 

Groups Take Steps to 

Disseminate Relevant 

Research, but IES Has 

Not Fully Assessed 

These Efforts
Page 10 GAO-13-852T

research information to policymakers and practitioners. However, some 

noted that further efforts are needed to leverage intermediary groups to 

better market REL and R & D Center work to reach IES’s target 

audiences.

IES does not have plans to evaluate the current group of RELs or R & D 

Centers, nor does it collect sufficient information to manage these groups’

efforts to disseminate relevant research.15 IES is still in the process of 

conducting a mandated evaluation of the prior group of RELs—whose 

contracts ended in 2011—but has no further plans to evaluate the current 

group of RELs.16 In addition, as of August 2013, IES had no plans to 

conduct a formal evaluation of the R & D Centers and there is no 

requirement to do so. Further, IES does not collect sufficient information 

about RELs and R & D Centers to manage these groups’ efforts to 

disseminate relevant research. For example, in 2012, IES, in 

collaboration with the RELs, developed nearly 50 performance indicators 

for these groups. IES officials told us that in August 2013 they had 

prioritized 24 of these indicators on which RELs must now report. 

However, IES has not established performance targets or goals for these 

selected measures. Were IES to establish targets or goals, there would 

be more incentive for the RELs to perform at the agency’s desired level, 

and IES would be better positioned to determine if RELs are meeting its 

expectations. Previous GAO work has indicated that agencies successful 

in measuring performance had performance measures including targets 

or goals that (1) demonstrate results; (2) are limited to the vital few; (3) 

cover multiple priorities; and (4) provide useful information for decision 

making.17

 15 The Comprehensive Centers are administered by Education’s Office of Elementary and 

Secondary Education. In 2011, IES completed a mandated evaluation of the 

Comprehensive Centers Program. See U.S. Department of Education, Institute of 

Education Sciences, National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance, 

National Evaluation of the Comprehensive Technical Assistance Centers: Final Report 

(Washington, D.C.: August 2011). IES recently released a new Request for Proposals to 

evaluate the current group of Comprehensive Centers. 

In addition, IES collects limited information to assess the R & D 

Centers’ dissemination efforts because IES does not require R & D 

Centers to report on their specific dissemination strategies or the 

16 This evaluation was mandated by ESRA and was required to be carried out in the third 

year of the RELs’ contracts. See, Pub. L. No. 107-279, § 174(j).

17 GAO, Tax Administration: IRS Needs to Further Refine Its Tax Filing Season 

Performance Measures, GAO-03-143 (Washington, D.C.: Nov. 22, 2002).
Page 11 GAO-13-852T

strategies’ effectiveness. Despite its difficulty, we have previously 

reported on ways in which agencies can assess research programs with 

broad dissemination goals.18

IES coordinates with other federal education research agencies on 

projects to increase federal agencies’ use of research evidence in guiding 

funding decisions. For example, IES co-led a joint Education-National 

Science Foundation working group to develop common evidence 

guidelines for federally-funded research in education. Several 

researchers we interviewed during our ongoing work, as well as two 

federal agencies we spoke with, said these guidelines will benefit the 

education field. In addition, IES helped develop and incorporate a tiered 

evidence framework for awarding grants for Education’s Investing in 

Innovation Fund (i3) grant program. According to an official from the 

Administration for Children and Families (ACF) at the Department of 

Health and Human Services, ACF has recently begun awarding its grants 

using Education’s i3 program model, which uses tiered-evidence 

standards to award larger grants to applicants with greater evidence of 

their programs’ effectiveness.

In addition to working with other federal agencies, IES coordinates within 

Education to facilitate collaboration between the REL and Comprehensive 

Center programs. In our ongoing work, directors of both groups told us 

coordination has improved with the current group of RELs and 

Comprehensive Centers, which began in 2012. In addition, some 

directors said that the RELs’ new structure of research alliances has 

improved coordination, as some Comprehensive Centers are now 

members of REL research alliances. This coordination, according to 

some directors with whom we spoke, has helped to address confusion 

among some SEA officials about the appropriate role and tasks 

performed by each. Some directors told us they have conducted joint 

visits with SEA officials, as well as made efforts to sequence their work 

for their state clients to better meet their needs. For example, some REL 

directors said the Comprehensive Center may conduct initial planning 

work for a project, and the REL would later assist with any aspects of the 

project requiring data analysis or original research.

 18 GAO, Program Evaluation: Strategies for Assessing How Information Dissemination 

Contributes to Agency Goals, GAO-02-923 (Washington, D.C.: (Sept. 30, 2002).

IES Coordinates with 

Other Federal 

Agencies, but 

Education Faces 

Challenges in Funding 

Program Evaluations
Page 12 GAO-13-852T

Within Education, IES and OPEPD are jointly responsible for program 

and policy evaluation, and together, these offices lead a department-wide 

planning process to identify evaluation projects to conduct.19 However, 

according to Education officials, efforts to prioritize evaluation projects 

through this annual process are hindered in part because of statutory 

requirements related to funding and program evaluation, including the fact 

that amounts designated for evaluation purposes under a program must 

be used only for evaluating that specific program or its activities. 

Specifically, officials reported that Education does not have the authority 

to combine evaluation funds from programs across the Department and 

use them to evaluate any program. As a result, some evaluations may not 

occur, and high-priority evaluations may be delayed. In addition, OPEPD 

and IES officials said that smaller programs often have insufficient funds 

to conduct an evaluation. We have previously reported that many 

Education programs, especially smaller programs, have not been 

evaluated, which can limit the ability of Congress to make informed 

decisions about which programs to continue, expand, modify, consolidate, 

or eliminate.20 Further, the President’s Budget request contained a 

proposal to increase Education’s flexibility to conduct program 

evaluations,21 and bills pending in Congress to reauthorize the 

Elementary and Secondary Education Act, including that of this 

committee, would address some of these issues for certain education 

programs.22

In conclusion, since its creation more than a decade ago, IES has made 

significant contributions to strengthening the rigor of the education 

research field and has considerably elevated the demand for conducting 

and has promoted the use of scientifically based research in our nation’s 

education system. However, IES could continue to build on these efforts 

by improving its ability to release relevant and timely information to 

policymakers and practitioners. With better management of its product 

review process to ensure the more timely release of reports and a more 

 19 See GAO, Program Evaluation: Experienced Agencies Follow a Similar Model for 

Prioritizing Research, GAO-11-176 (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 14, 2011). 

20 GAO, Opportunities to Reduce Potential Duplication in Federal Teacher Quality 

Programs, GAO-11-510T (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 13, 2011).

21 Office of Management and Budget, Budget of the U.S. Government, Fiscal Year 2014. 

(Washington, D.C.: Apr. 10, 2013).

22 H.R. 5, 113th Cong. (2013) and S. 1094, 113th Cong. (2013).
Page 13 GAO-13-852T

structured process for incorporating stakeholders’ needs into its research 

agenda, IES would position itself to more fully deliver on its mission to be 

responsive to the needs of its various stakeholders. Similarly, 

comprehensive performance measures and routine assessment of its 

grantees’ and contractors’ dissemination strategies would ensure its 

stewardship of federal investments in these areas. In addition, the ability 

to prioritize and conduct effective evaluations is critical to helping make 

the best use of limited resources and to support Congress in making 

informed decisions about which programs to continue, expand, modify, 

consolidate, or eliminate. As we complete our ongoing work, we will 

consider any recommendations needed to address these issues.

Chairman Kline, Ranking Member Miller, and Members of the Committee, 

this concludes my prepared statement. I will be pleased to answer any 

questions that you may have.

For future contact regarding this testimony, please contact George A. 

Scott at (202) 512-7215 or scottg@gao.gov. Key contributors to this 

testimony were Scott Spicer (Assistant Director), Lucas Alvarez, Deborah 

Bland, Nora Boretti, David Chrisinger, Elizabeth Curda, Rachel Frisk, 

Dana Hopings, Jean McSween and James Rebbe.

GAO Contact and 

Staff 

Acknowledgments

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